Amelie: A peace promoting film
an article by Sanders Moore

Amelie, a French film that has recently been introduced in the United States, is about a young woman that decides to do acts of random kindness to improve the quality of people's lives. Originally, Amelie was not an extremely happy person. She got the idea to help others when she found an old box in her apartment that a boy left when he lived there years ago. Amelie went on a mission to find the boy (now a man) and observe how the box affected him. She decided if receiving the box pleased the man, she would continue to do good deeds to others.

Fortunately, once she delivered the box, the man decided to reunite with his estranged family. This caused her to continue acts such as these to help people on a small level feel better about themselves. Two older people with poor dispositions complained all the time and did not appear to be happy at all. Amelie made it her mission to get them together to improve both of their dispositions as well as help those around them. There was a big difference in the attitudes of these characters from before and after Amelie became involved in their lives. She promoted the idea of people that are different from one another co-existing in harmony.

People can learn from this movie and the little things one can do to make others happier. If everyone strove to make one more person happy each day, or even each week, the world would be a much more pleasant place. Maybe happier people would promote peace, or at least be less violent. Not only does helping someone out assist in those people's lives, but also in the person's life that has done the work.

DISCUSSION

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"Random acts of kindness"
How much do they promote a culture of peace?

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CULTURE OF PEACE IN EVERYDAY LIFE

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From a review by Sanders Moore:
Amelie, a French film that has recently been introduced in the United States, is about a young woman that decides to do acts of random kindness to improve the quality of people's lives... People can learn from this movie and the little things one can do to make others happier. If everyone strove to make one more person happy each day, or even each week, the world would be a much more pleasant place. Maybe happier people would promote peace, or at least be less violent. Not only does helping someone out assist in those people's lives, but also in the person's life that has done the work.

This report was posted on April 18, 2002. The moderator is Robin.

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